Cedar Rapids man worried about relatives in New Zealand earthquake zone

Jeffrey Moores is helpless. He has family in Christchurch, New Zealand, where an earthquake has killed at least 75 people, but he has not been able to get in touch with them.

“Oh, that's bad,” Moores said, his eyes glued to footage of the destruction on TV. “This is really a shock, but what more can I do? It's a long way to fly back.”

The time difference, sparse media coverage and damage to infrastructure in New Zealand have all made it difficult for Moores and his wife to keep tabs on the earthquake's aftermath.

Moores sat in his Cedar Rapids living room last night, hoping to catch updates. Cable news outlets were jumping to the destruction in New Zealand for just a minute or so each hour amid nearly constant coverage of unrest in Africa.

“With not being able to find out what's going on or what happened - are they OK? It's got me worried,” Moores said. “Yeah, I'm worried.”

Moores moved to Iowa from New Zealand in 2002. He lived in Christchurch for a couple of years in the 1970s and has a brother, a sister-in-law and a nephew still there.

Moores also is struggling to get in touch with family in Brisbane, Australia, where locals are reeling from destructive floods earlier this year.

Those disasters have largely been upstaged by uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. Moores has been using Facebook and news websites based elsewhere to get updates. He said coverage by mainstream American media has been “pathetic.”

“They call it ‘world news,' but it doesn't cover those people who live down under,” he said.

Reports from the region show the quake was magnitude 6.3, and experts expect it to be the deadliest one in the country since the 1930s. Officials have declared a national state of emergency and the prime minister called it New Zealand's “darkest day.”

Aside from the human loss, Moores cringes at pictures of toppled buildings in the city.

“Especially the churches - some of them have been there for more than 150 years,” Moores said. “It's just atrocious.”

Likely the only bright spot for New Zealanders is the international support. President Barack Obama offered condolences to the country, and the United States is sending rescue workers to aid authorities in New Zealand. Other countries have pitched in similar help.

“That's a blessing for such a small country to have such good things,” Moores said.